[v2] Add a plugin as a part of tauri app

[pronebird]

Hi,

I found that plugins are a decent way to break down the complex app onto smaller parts and I'd like to just define one quickly inside of my tauri app.

After defining and wiring up the plugin, all I see is this in my javascript console:

Plugin did not define its manifest

How can I tackle this quickly? Maybe there is a call I can make in PluginApi to get rid of this nonsense and get going?

[FabianLars]

inline plugins are unfortunetely not as nice to use as in v1 due to the permission changes. You will have to modify your build.rs file similar to https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri/blob/dev/examples/api/src-tauri/build.rs#L9-L12 (it's for https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri/blob/dev/examples/api/src-tauri/src/menu_plugin.rs)

[watsom27]

Are there any plans to change this? Migrating from a v1 app with tens of "inline plugins", each with tens of command handlers is not turning out to be a friendly experience.

Especially when it seems like we also have to "allow list" each command in our own plugins?

[FabianLars]

As far as i am aware, the "modify build.rs" requirement will stay, at least in the initial 2.0 release(s), but the last version added an option to generate default permissions for you so you don't have to allow the commands one by one manually. #10559

[watsom27]

Thank you for the reply.

What is the reasoning around keeping the "modify build.rs" requirement?

Why do we need to whitelist our own code?

[FabianLars]

Because the new plugin system was designed without inline plugins in mind (as far as i know at least, i wasn't involved in that) so we're talking about potentially large changes (or maybe not considering that we'd "just" have to do what i linked behind the scenes). Do not overlook the at least in the initial 2.0 release(s) part though, 2.0 is basically in a feature freeze right now and the team is generally really busy right now.

I'm also not sure if we keep the inline plugin concept in v3 etc or switch to something else, considering that most people only started using them because they didn't want to have one huge list of commands which is something that could be solved differently. But again, not really involved there 🤷